(1) Field of the Invention
This invention relates to cotton ginning and more particularly to a lint cleaner in a cotton gin. A cotton ginner is one having ordinary skill in this art.
As used herein, cotton gin refers to the building and all the structure and machinery within the building for receiving harvested seed cotton and separating the seed from the lint, and also removing the trash from the seed and lint.
Seed cotton refers to the cotton as harvested which will include not only the seed with the lint on the seed, but also burrs, sticks and other trash.
Cotton seed is used to refer to the seed with the cotton lint removed therefrom.
Lint is used synonymously with cotton lint and refers to the fibers of cellulose which form the lint and which have been separated from the seed.
The machinery used in the cotton gin is different from the machinery used in cotton mills. The cotton gins are required to handle high volumes of product. The modern cotton gins will process as much or more than 20 bales of cotton per hour. Also, the cotton leaving the cotton gin will not be as smooth and free of twisted fibers, naps, and the like, as is required by the cotton mills for the cotton to be spun into yarn and thread. The cotton gin machinery must first and foremost process cotton quickly. Cotton mills must process cotton so that the lint is in condition to be spun.
(2) Description of the Related Art
The first step in the preparation of cotton is normally done by a cotton gin. At the cotton gin the seed cotton is first cleaned. A common type of cleaner for cleaning the seed cotton as it arrives, is an "air-line cleaner", or an "inclined cleaner". Basically, these terms are different names for the same machine. Basically, in these cleaners, the cotton including burrs, sticks, trash, leaf particles and dirt, are carried along in an airstream. The entire mass of harvested material is wiped across a screen. Originally these screens were formed of a heavy, woven wire. Presently, they are often round bars parallel to a spiked drum which wipes the seed cotton across the screen. The wiping the seed cotton across the screen separates considerable dust, leaf trash, and sticks from the seed cotton and the cotton carried in the airstream. Also, in some of the seed cotton cleaning, the burr is removed. Normally in this step, the locks of seed cotton are snagged upon saw teeth and brought across bars. Often the bars are mounted on cylinders for rotating so that the surface of the saw teeth is moving in an opposite direction from the surface of the bars. In this manner the burrs are knocked free from the locks of seed cotton.
Regardless of the cleaning steps that are involved before the seed cotton is ginned, it is not unusual for it to be cleaned by several cleaning steps.
A gin stand removes the seed from the lint. Normally this is done by snagging the lint upon saw teeth and pulling the lint through spaces between ribs. The spacing of the ribs is too narrow for the seed to pass, and therefore the lint is pulled free of the seed. The cotton lint is doffed from the saw by brushes or air blast. The lint cotton is carried in an airstream.
After the lint has been separated from the seed it customarily is cleaned. For a saw lint cleaner the lint is first separated from the air and formed into a batt. Then, the batt is snagged on the teeth of the lint cleaner and brushed against stationary bars to remove fine leaf particles, and other trash, from the lint. Thereafter the lint was doffed from the saws of the lint cleaner, again condensed and baled into balers.
Often the cotton is passed through two saw lint cleaners. In the saw process of cleaning the lint it is not unusual to form naps or nips, or to crimp and twist the fibers of the cotton, resulting in a rough texture of the cotton, rather than a smooth cotton which is more easily handled by textile mills to spin into yarn to form threads for weaving.